


On cold days cold plays out like the band's name.

by elisewin



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-25
Updated: 2013-01-25
Packaged: 2017-11-26 20:58:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,042
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/654357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elisewin/pseuds/elisewin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis really hates winter, especially after his train stops because of a blizzard. But maybe someone will make him change his mind. (au!)</p>
            </blockquote>





	On cold days cold plays out like the band's name.

**Author's Note:**

> I've written this for a challenge @ maridichallenge @LJ, which is an italian community but I'm too cool to write in my mother tongue apparently. Kidding. 
> 
> Anyway the prompt was 'snow' and I got this idea because of a book I've read this Christmas, called Let It Snow.

Louis has just stood up from his seat to get to the bathroom when the train abruptly stops.

 

For a moment he thinks they must have reached a stop he doesn't remember about, but that train doesn't do any intermediate stops between London and Manchester and there's still half an hour left or something. Then he looks outside the window and notices that he can't see a damn thing outside because is snowing, although that would be an understatement. _Blizzard_ would be the right word to define it.

It is already dark outside, but there's nothing to see except white, snow flakes moved by the ferocious wind.

“Fuck,” he murmurs, and thinks, _why the hell didn't I go to Uni in Manchester._

But no, _he had to_ go to London. Like he couldn't properly function without going to study in London, fuck his stupid ideas and the two hours train ride that will probably become a few more, if the snow doesn't stop falling.

Stupid snow and stupid London and stupid winter.

Between swears, Louis remembers why he got up from his seat in the first place – he goes to the bathroom just in time before the lights go off. Right after there's an announcement saying they are really sorry and they will try to get back everything to normal as soon as possible. Louis takes out his cell phone to at least try not to stumble upon someone or something while walking back to his seat. If he'll ever find it, anyway, since a lot of people got up and are protesting loudly and it's all really confusing and Louis silently agrees with himself to ask for a transfer to Manchester as soon as possible.

His coach didn't seem so far from the bathroom when he got to it, so he probably must have gone too far.

The only person who doesn't look too distraught by the situation in this coach he is in now is a boy still sat at his place, reading a book using his cell phone's screen light to see something.

“You will probably turn blind very soon,” Louis comments out loud – he was supposed to keep the comment for himself but it slipped out and now he feels a complete idiot.

The boy doesn't look up from his book at first, but he a smiles a bit, or it is probably Louis's mind playing tricks because the only light is the one coming from the boy's cell phone and he can barely sees his face. “Sorry, I think I lost my way. Is this coach seven?” he asks, so he doesn't completely sound like an idiot and he actually approached the boy for a reason. The boy finally looks up and speaks.

“No, this one's six, mate, sorry,” he answers, going back to this book. Louis thanks him and is already leaving him. “You might be right about my sight, though,” the boy unexpectedly adds. Louis turns back.

“Yeah, well, it must be a very good book if you're willing to sacrifice one of your senses for it.”

This time the boy laughs and this time Louis doesn't imagine it.

“I wish, I have an exam next week and I'm quite behind,” he explains. Louis is about to say something else when a woman running through the corridor hits him with her bag.

“Ohi!” Louis shouts, since the woman didn't even care to say sorry.

“You better sit down before someone kills you,” the boy says, gesturing to the place right in front of him. Louis smiles and does as he told him.

“So what is your exam about...?” Louis says, remembering that he doesn't know the name of the boy yet.

“Harry. It's for an History exam, Victorian age,” he answers.

“Good luck with it, then. I'm Louis, by the way,” he says, and the boy, Harry, finally closes the book and puts the cell phone back in his pocket.

“Nice to meet you, Louis. Where are you headed to?”

“Manchester, luckily. If we ever get there,” Louis answers, thinking that maybe he should inform his friend Stan before he goes to the station and waits for him for hours. “I am supposed to go out with some friends that study there,” he explains, while typing a text _'train got stuck, ill keep u updated.'._ “What about you?” He asks then.

“I am supposed to go home, in Cheshire, but I will probably miss my other train in Manchester,” he answers.

“That sucks, mate. Do you have a place to stay, 'cause it wouldn't be a problem to -” gee, is he really inviting this boy he barely knows at Stan's?

“No problem, my dad lives there. But thanks anyway,” Harry says. People keep on going up and down the corridors, moving in a frenzy from coach to coach, people calling friends and family informing them about their position and saying that they really love them – from the way they act it looks like apocalypse is going to happen soon, and Louis can't help but let go a laugh, and Harry asks him what's the deal.

“I was looking at all this people going up and down the train, we're probably the only two people sitting quietly right now,” Louis explains, but Harry points out that there's a man who has been sleeping since the train has left London, a couple of seats behind Louis, and hasn't woken up yet. He hasn't noticed him when he walked in the coach earlier, too busy looking at his own feet. “Should we check if he still breathes?” Harry laughs at that and in the dark Louis can barely sees his face, but the sound of his laugh is – well, if he could record it and put it as ring tone for his text messages, he would do it. Let's put it this way. Now he knows how he wants to spend the time he has left on this train (and, judging from the hysterical screams of some people, that would be a long, long time) doing his best attempts to make Harry laugh. He might not see the boy again so he better make the best out of these hours.

“John!John!” a woman screams entering the coach. When she sees the two boys she stops.

“Have you seen a little blonde kid passing this way?” She cries, and both Louis and Harry say they're sorry but they haven't seen any kid, and she moves to the next coach, shouting her son's name. The man who was sleeping, well, is still sleeping even after that.

They talk a bit about their Unis, Louis tells Harry that he will probably move to Manchester, the rides home are always too expensive and the few times he actually gets home, well. _Trains don't fucking work._ Harry confesses he chose London because of a crush he had on someone, but eventually he didn't feel the same again but he settled down there and made new friends so he didn't mind staying there.

“I like London, going around, getting lost between people. My hometown is so small, I'm not saying I know everyone personally, but you have that feeling you always see the same faces, and that never happens in London,” he explains. Louis feels sad about that now, because he knows they will probably never meet again. “So are you from Manchester, or..?” Harry asks.

“No, no, Doncaster,” Louis answers proudly, “but most of my friends study there. I was planning on going home tomorrow but who knows if this blizzard will ever end.” In a way he wishes it never did.

 

After a while, people seem to calm down a bit. Louis wonders if the woman has found her son. The man still sleeps, now snores, even.

“I have to go take my bag before they steal my iPod, ” he excuses himself.

“Okay, but don't lose your way or I will start to look for you like that poor woman earlier,” Harry jokes, and Louis promises that he will come back really soon.

This time, he finds the right coach and his seat – luckily his iPod is still in the pocket of the bag – he takes it and his jacket and come back to Harry, who's on the phone now, Louis supposes with his father because he's explaining his situation and that he will never get the last train for his hometown in time.

Harry hangs up and asks “So, was your quest for your iPod successful?”

“Yes, it was,” Louis answers, taking it out of the bag's pocket to show him. So it seems natural to talk about music next. Harry defines Louis' tastes 'schizophrenic' after he hands him his iPod to show the other boy what he has got on it, while Harry seems the ultimate hipster, naming band with the weirdest names, longer than the length of their actual songs. He says he forgot his iPod in London but Louis doesn't believe him, he probably has some really shameful tracks on there and doesn't want to lose his hipster attitude.

 

So when the lights finally turn on and the engine of the train seems to come back to life, Louis is almost disappointed. Not because he can finally see Harry's face – he loses his train of thoughts right after the lights are on, because the boy has these amazing green eyes and he can't look away and _dammit._ When he finally manages to look away, he turns to see if the sleepy man is still asleep and he hasn't even flinched. He comments on that and Harry laughs and not only does his laugh has the most angelic sound in the world but also the way his whole face lights up and _his fucking dimples,_ is all too much.This boy doesn't really exist and Louis must have been dreaming.

There's a new announcement then – _sorry for the inconvenience, we won't be able to travel at our usual speed now, it will now take us another hour or so to get to Manchester._ People start to protest again “we were supposed to be there now, I can't believe it! I want a refund!”

 

Louis, for once, doesn't feel particularly angry for being late. They stay silent for a while, listening to the rants of people and looking outside – still nothing except for white snow, really. Even looking outside a window feels good and it is just so stupid and Louis can't let go of this feeling he had since he first spoke to Harry and, only forty minutes according to the announcement and they will be in Manchester and then what? It was nice to meet you, hope to see you on the ride back? There are so many trains going from Manchester to London every day that -

“When are you going back to London?” Harry asks. Is he a telepathic or what?

“Sunday, at five pm, if I'll ever survive lunch at home with my parents and my sisters,” Louis answers, and now he's really hoping he will say _oh what a coincidence I'm taking the same train!_

“Oh okay,” is his only comment. Oh okay? So, what is that supposed to mean? See you on Sunday? I don't really care I only asked because I wanted to be polite? Harry seems the kind of type that speaks to you only because he wants to be polite, when inside he's thinking, _this idiot who has Jay Z on his iPod, why am I even talking to him. Luckily we'll be in Manchester soon and I won't have to see him again._

Louis would normally start talking a lot, about nothing in particular, just to cover the silence, but now he's like – paralyzed, lost in his thoughts, thinking about the next thing to say but anything that comes to his mind is rather too invasive and personal or too stupid and will surely make the wrong impression (though maybe he already ruined everything because of his iPod). So he stays silent and doesn't dare give a name to that feeling. It feels all too rushed. Why would he want to make a good impression on a younger boy, he never does care _that_ much. He talks a lot with strangers and get all his friends embarrassed. This time there's no one to get embarrassed except himself.

 

It's Harry who talks then, asking him about his sisters, since he mentioned them earlier. Louis is happy to talk about them – Harry says is great that he seems to be such a caring and affectionate brother. Louis says he really does miss them when he's not home and he talks with them on Skype more than he likes to admit. Harry tells him about his older sister, Gemma, and that they both love each other very much, but sometimes he would have loved having a bigger family like Louis's. Louis says he would have loved not being the older one, too many responsibilities. Talking about family makes him relax a bit.

When they get closer to Manchester the blizzard seems over, now snow flakes are graciously dancing outside the window and Louis can see the landscape – he recognizes it, and he sees that they're really close now. He has informed Stan earlier, his friend writes him he is in the station waiting for him.

 

There are only ten minutes left or something, and Harry is telling him a story about a time he made a snowman in the backyard of his house, and how happy he is anytime it snows because it makes him feel five years old all over again, while Louis says he's not a big fan of the winter and if he could and go live in Brazil in its perpetual summer, he would. Sipping cocktails all day on the beach. He has experienced something similar on vacations in Spain, and he hates that they never get all that sun in England.

The speakers come to life again “we're now arriving in Manchester, sorry again for the inconvenience.”

People start to put on their jackets – Louis has never been sadder to see his friends. Not that he doesn't want to see them, okay, but. _Harry._ He would love to stare into his eyes and know exactly what he's thinking, that would make things so much easier. He stares into them anyway, although he cannot read through them. Louis thinks about that Coldplay's song, Green Eyes. Harry said to him earlier that Coldplay are his favorite band, so Louis knows exactly that the song is going to haunt him for the rest of the night, or maybe the _entire_ weekend, and when he'll be pissed he will start to sing out loud and embarrass his friends just like he always does. Or maybe he won't get pissed because he doesn't want them to know about the boy he met on the train. The train stops at platform three as Louis is putting his gloves on.

He and Harry look at each other at the same exact time and smile. Louis is fucking _burning_ outside, which will probably be a good thing after all, since outside it won't stop snowing and that will keep him warm.

 

“So, uhm, it has been a pleasure knowing you, Harry,” Louis says while they stand up.

“Me too, Louis,” Harry says. They wait as other people slowly make their way outside the coach. They wait and stand here and Louis feels every minute more and more pathetic because he's trying to hold on those moments for as long as possible and when they finally get off he doesn't even notice Stan a few meters away waving at him. He's still looking at Harry hugging his dad thigh. The boy turns to Louis and says bye before leaving the station.

“Ohi, I'm here?” Stan says, now in front of him, “t _hanks for coming here to pick me and facing the snow just for me,Stan_ , no problem, mate.” Louis snorts.

“Sorry, yeah, thanks. You're the best, mate,” he says and hugs him, “missed you.”

 

*

 

The Manchester station on Sunday is packed of people and Louis looks around, trying to do that as casually as possible, trying not to seem like he really _care_.

His mom gave him a lift to the station but has left right after, saying, _you should come home often, I miss you so much, why did you have to go to London._

It's not sunny, but at least it's not snowing anymore. It hasn't stopped for the whole night on Friday, and somehow Louis has managed not to get pissed completely. At least, he hasn't sung Green Eyes in front of his friends. But he couldn't stop humming the song for the whole weekend – and is now playing on his iPod.

He looks around but he doesn't have any hope, because this is not a fucking movie and Harry is not going to run in slow motion to catch the train just in time or miss it for a second but he will wave at Louis and tell him how much he loves him even though he has met him for just a few hours on a train. And Louis would be really depressed because he doesn't even know his surname and he couldn't look up for every single Harry living in London on Facebook, but somehow they would bump into each other in London in a Starbucks and like, take the same drink at the same time and laugh and.

Louis walks to the right platform – the train is there but hasn't opened the doors yet. A few people are waiting, but of course no one is curly with green eyes.

 

Someone takes out one of his earplugs. He is about to say _what the fuck are you doing_ when the person speaks -

“You will probably turn deaf very soon,” and _ohmygod_ Louis knows that voice and he turns and it's Harry and he's smiling at him and all he wants to do is fucking hug him and this is _so much_ better than the movie Louis imagined and the stupid meeting in Starbucks. This is so much better because is _real_.

 

Louis smiles and silently thanks the snow.  


End file.
